I’m saying that that’s the perception across a large part of the organisation. Whether the perception is true or not is almost irrelevant because the fact that the circumstances have been allowed to develop to form that perception is troublesome.
I reflect on the experiences of some of my cadets. There are several who, despite having been cadets for multiple years, have never flown. For some of these, it’s the fact that they need an additional medical that’s prevented them from doing so (even when their only condition is mild autism), but for others there simply hasn’t been sufficient slots either gliding or flying due to decisions made at a strategic level.
My own personal perception is that the RAF is trying to barge the Air Cadets out of their aircraft. Some of that can be put down to genuine operational need, but not all of it. I also feel that data collection and management is probably not well enough formed for HQAC to have an accurate national-level view on what proportion of cadets this is true for.
What this reads as, however you intended it, is that initially you said it’s a resource issue, then when questioned as to what we could do to increase the resource, you’ve said that it isn’t a resource issue and it’s because the providers we want to use aren’t RAF, and that’s the end of it and you’ll never look to change that.
Can you see why we’re frustrated with that? We’re told it’s because you don’t have the staff, then when asked how we can support you with that you’ve changed tact and said that even with the resources you wouldn’t look to change it.
You might well be happy with the activities on offer, but the cadets and staff are not. Whether that’s because you’re being fed particular viewpoints from your staff or because you aren’t being given any information at all I’m not sure but as we’ve repeatedly said the RAF will never have the capacity to fly any meaningful proportion of cadets, not now and not in 5 year’s time.
As ever it is a balance of many competing demands and challenges which I have the privilege of overseeing supported by a wide range of brilliant people. There are very clear resource issues at play (where human resource is a significant challenge for RAFAC), safety and a judgement on the best overall outcomes for the whole organisation. It’s called the RAF Air Cadets where flying is very important but so too is the link to the parent organisation and the wider offer of the breadth of activities that we offer. I applaud the passion to get more flying for our Cadets but our offer is a balance of various factors. I see a lot of RAFAC across the country and I see an organisation which has much to offer and one where our young people are thriving. It’s not perfect, but, with civil and appropriate discourse, we can continue to improve where possible. And we are.
Just the past few years data that shows exactly how squadrons in my wing are doing for flying. The trend seems to be massive reductions on post covid year on year flying.
I appreciate we have the rest of this year to run, allocations so far, even if not weathered off through winter, will struggle to match 2023.
The overall counters at the bottom show total flying opportunities, as I no longer have the luxury of distinguishing between AEF and VGS, but only - has this squadron had an airborne opportunity this year?
NB. doesn’t include muster/flying from camps but just allocated AEF/VGS slots.
The sqn that are in the green with 4 slots flown in 2024 was actually a last minute CCF drop out where they filled the equivalent cadet spaces of 4 slots. Several of the others are due to sqns in my wing being quick to pick up last minute weekday flying that is canx from the CCF.
I always get the impression that as a wing we are better served than others for flying, which means some wings figures will make for very depressing reading.
Which says a lot, as even in a wing that is generally “well served” for flying, I’m going to maybe only get every squadron a single allocation of 3 or 4 cadets for the whole year.
RAF aren’t responsible for the standards that the CAA as such, and AVM Marshall is but one voice on the board, two ex-RAF. I note that the remaining members have no experience in aviation at all.
At the end of the day @cab as AOC 22 Group has stated his position at the moment, but that may change in the future if there are extra resources.
So it would take 5 years at that rate for every cadet to get a flying slot of some description (VGS or AEF) if that rate was just maintained (and distributed fairly), but it actually seems to be slipping.
Given most cadets join at 12.5 and leave around 16 or so, there’s a genuine risk of cadets never being given the opportunity to fly. Absolutely damning.
*Numbers have been chosen that give the best chance for HQAC to look good. Real world could actually be worse.
Do we know what the length of the average Cadet career is these day? It used to be 18 months but that we very pre-Covid and I’ve not seen more upto date figures.
Interesting how we can get all sorts of different numbers depending on how we apply the maths. Yet the numbers never look good, no mater how the maths is done. I calculated assuming the join at 12 and leave at 18 approx.
It’s not a risk, it’s reality for the majority.
I’ve just looked back, and of the 17 cadets who left the Sqn in the last 12 months, only 5 got to fly in anything!
That 1OS Sqn post was about part of a self organised weeklong, multi-activity camp. I’m still amazed that they managed to get so many of the Sqn up gliding; I mean to take nothing away from the Sqn for actually having managed this. Well done to them - it shows their commitment flying en-mass to get gliding and everything else achieved that week.
